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Free from the spaceship and reunited with Samuai, Asher should be happy. But thoughts of her dead family weigh heavily on her mind.
Things worsen when temper problems in camp lead to a murder. When Asher volunteers to get the drug need to calm people down, tension ignites.

Loyalties are questioned.

Jealousy rears its head. Sparks fly.

And when rumor of a second ship hits close to home, all bets are off.
Have the aliens returned? Is this the end of everything Asher has ever known?

This is the second book in a series, so if you haven’t read Lifer yet, be careful going forward!

So a few months ago, I read Lifer by Beck Nicholas. While I did enjoy it, there were times when I thought things were too easily resolved, and Blank was too stereotypical with how he thought Megs was hot. The way the book ended off answered some questions, but it also left many open, including a lot of new ones. So while I was a little bit iffy about the first book, I knew I had to read the next.

AND I AM SO GLAD I DID.

First off, Nicholas introduces a new problem that I wasn’t expecting. Rage. Flaring tempers. Yes, there’s a reason the book is called Temper. That’s because, after leaving the ship, everyone got a little bit grumpy, and there was uncertainty as to whether this was simply people being naturally upset…or something more. There were plenty of mysteries and secrets in this book, and what was happening to the Lifers and Fishies was just one of them.

Then there was the added complexity of three social groups trying to live together, two of which needed to get used to the fact that, hey, they were all equals on the ground! Lady continued to be a ridiculous woman, thinking she could continue her life of luxury on the ground. The Green Robes thought they could call the shots and manipulate information, with everyone in camp oblivious to this except the very person who convinced his people to trust the greens. So basically, lots of social tension to enjoy!

As for the characters, there was a lot more depth and complexity this time round. While it seemed clearcut at the end of Lifer that Samuai and Asher had effectively split up and were ‘set’ with Megs and Davyd respectively, Nicholas brought reality down on them. Samuai and Asher had real “young love”, and that couldn’t be so easily swept aside. There were still feelings there, and Nicholas played with those rather well. Especially that little truth bomb that was going to go off at any point – the truth about Asher’s brother, Zed.

Asher really grew as a character. She’d just lost her mom after having to come to terms with losing her brother at the start of Lifer. She believed herself to be alone and expendable, so she volunteered to go on what was very likely a suicide mission. While she could have broken down or turned to others for help, she drew on her own strength and worked through the pain and rage herself. She was her own rock, even with two brothers vying for that role.

Samuai also had his chapters, like the last time. While Asher was off trying to save the world (or kill herself), he was left to play diplomat. Except that, while he was the one who brought the greens to the Pelican, he wasn’t too sure about them now. How long can someone play politics once they find out one side is hiding some pretty big things? In Samuai’s case…not long. In the meantime, he also had all that inner turmoil over Zed to think about, and Megs to keep at arm’s length while he continued to work out his feelings for Asher.

Davyd was… well, Davyd was typical Davyd. I still wanted to punch him a bunch of times. I couldn’t figure him out, which only made we want to keep reading because HE ANNOYED THE CRAP OUT OF ME.

The plot wasn’t what I was expecting, and it kept throwing real twists at me. While I had to push myself to keep reading Lifer at times, Temper pulled me along effortlessly. Based on the trajectory of this series, I can only hypothesise that the next book will completely blow my mind!

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